Lord Barminster glanced at him coldly.
"My good man," he said, "you heard what my son said just. You had better make inquiries of the police. Mr. Leroy has not seen your niece."
"That is not quite true," put in Adrien gently, "I have seen her."
Lady Constance raised her pale face, and looked at him with startled but trusting eyes.
"P'raps you'll say you didn't take her to your rooms next," said Wilfer.
"I don't deny it," replied Adrien calmly. "I found her on a doorstep, starving with hunger, fleeing from a drunken uncle, as she said. There was nowhere else to take her, being late at night; so I took her to my chambers and fed her, then gave her into the charge of Norgate and the housekeeper until morning, when I learned that she had disappeared. That is all I can tell you about her; for I have not seen her since."
"But I have," came a voice--a woman's voice--behind them, "and I have brought her here."
The little company turned round, and Adrien started as his eyes fell upon the three new-comers.
"Ada," he cried. "What is the meaning of this intrusion?"
"No intrusion this time, Mr. Leroy," she said firmly. "I am here by your father's own invitation."